


Oath of Remembrance

by Eluvian



Category: Horizon: Zero Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Loving nature, Mourning the lost world, thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:08:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23487319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eluvian/pseuds/Eluvian
Summary: Okay, so this is not really Aloy. This is me. I just had this image of looking around in this world and touching the grass and thinking that oh my god it is just here while the whole world has been lost and all those people suffered so much and it was, like, ages ago. And the whole world is silent and we cannot do anything about it anymore.So this is what I felt and I thought I would write it. That's all. :)
Relationships: Aloy & Elisabet Sobeck
Kudos: 6





	Oath of Remembrance

Blue is the colour of the sky

Green is the colour of the grass

White is the colour of the snow

Yellow is the colour of the sun

It sent chills down her spine. They haven’t seen it. They were closed inside and when they got out… they should have known so much. But the knowledge was corrupted and now she is never going to find out.

Aloy tried to process the thought. Again and again. Many hours it felt too much. It had already felt too much to go through all these battles. But she didi t. She could not stop because there was no one else to do it if she was not willing. The whole world was at stake.

Elisabet Sobeck understood it.

And she understood it again. So she acted.

Aloy found herself lingering at her reflection whenever she saw a piece of glass, or a sheet of water. She tucked her little, always escaping threads of hair behind here ars and examined her face. She hadd never been a vain creature, and she did not do it now to admire her beauty. She wanted to accept who she was.

That there was a person who looked exactly the same, a thousand yars back.

Who thought maybe the same. Who _was_ essentially the same.

_I am who she was._

She did not have the memories, only those tiny fragments of cold, dead, blue reflection that told her all about her past. Their words lingered in her brain. Their hopes. Their desperation. Their laughter. When they’d spoken, itf felt as if they were… alive. With her. At that moment. And than the data stream ended and she found herself, again, in the cold, purple-blue reality.

It was all long gone.

She could not even understand what this meant. A thousand years.

She walked in the grass, barefoot. As a kid, her skin grew used to all types of surfaces. She was wild, of course, she did not always care for her well-being. But it made her feel great. Free. This time her light copper hair was free as well. No braids, just its natural curls dancing int he wind. She glanced around and all she saw was lush green trees, hills, which she knew held lakes and silver machines which now she knew were making this Earth more livable.

The imitations of once living creatures.

She just lay down int he ground, watching the bright blue sky. Based on what she’d read and heard the world before… It used to be full of smoke. Metal. How could have people lived in it? Did they hate it? Did they get used to it? Did it seem normal for them, to not look at something green for months? To live in such high places, like in those buildings which stood there, rustily, surrounded by the roaming Tallneck that she once climbed? It was crazy to think that people lived there. Although – this should have been the tiniest detail she was surprised by.

Her thoughts kept railing back to those humans before her. She looked down at her skin and thought of Elisabet. She. Was. The. Same. All their words echoed in her mind. They tried… they tried to hard to save themselves. But when they found out they could not, they created something that would at least give life another chance for someone else. Even though they knew they would never see it.

She was so grateful for them. They did not just accept the fate that they were going to die. They fought. Could life be this strong? She never thought… well, deep down she knew.

She had to know.

She satu p, her knees surrounded by the green stalks of grass.

The childish recital entered her mind. “Green is the colour of the grass.” Which they have never seen. Closed in. Almost all their lives. And then having to come out here, with no knowledge. And everyone who she had seen was the predecessor of those humans.

In a way, people lived on.

But they would never know.

She remembered all those who chose to die instead of taking part in the project. While she had gone through the chambers, she felt like she’d been living with them. Sharing their desperation. Sharing their realisation about what happened. After the cold silence. After a thousand years.

There was nothing else she could do now. Nothing she could do for them. They were gone, parished, and she did not know why she kept focussing on that thought.

She let the tears pierce through the barrier she felt so strong. She let her shoulders shake with the unimaginable incapability to change the past, she let the wind carry her sobs through the wind. Her hands stroked through the grass, wondering what it could have been like before. Air filled her lungs that was the product of a machine created by her kind. It was machines that destroyed them – and machines that brought them back.

A new world, completely closed off from the previous one.

She felt alone. She wanted to talk to her. Elisabet. No matter that technically they were identical, Aloy thought of her a little as a parent. After all, a human could not process not having one. She could imagine being brought to life in that metal cradle, but… She thought it would make her crazy.

All these people, they adored the machines like some gods. How little did they know.If she told them the truth, their whole world would have collapsed. It was only her that knew.

And Sylens. But that man had no feelings. She felt weak and pathetic compared to him, as tears kept rolling down her cheeks. She was crying for the lost world. She was crying because of their desperate words and the fact that no matter how bad she wanted to take their hands or even listen to them, it wouldn’t be possible now. She was just someone that stumbled upon the ruins of their society. Luckily, not too late. And they were just… a memory.

She needed a little time with them. Of course, they did not exist anymore. But she did, and she swore she would protect their memory forever. Pass it on, if she found a person fitting for that.

She visited Elisabet’s “grave” often. She felt a little crazy, talking to her, but it did calm her down. People in Meridian sometimes scribbled their thoughts on the leaves of the ancients. She spoke.

Maybe she would write it down sometime. Everything that is happened to her. So that if someone finds them later – just like she had found all those data entries that uncovered the truth about the Metal World – they would learn from her.

But she swore to make sure the mistakes are not repeated again.

She shoved her face into the flowery scent of the soil, being one with nature. It was quiet and so unknowing about what made it live. These flowers just bloomed, colourful and innocent, accepting life and passing it on. They did not think, they did not try to find answers. They just lived.

That was what she wanted to do. But she needed a little time to collect herself. She wanted to close these emotions in herself, so she approached a tree and after making sure there was absolutely no human being to watch here – which was very likely, but she just had to make sure – she folded her arms around its trunk and whispered that she would protect it. At any cost.

She took a few minutes before going back to her obligations. Just a little break.


End file.
